Conventional communication systems often include communication devices that are used by system users to receive messages. A message transmission device, such as a paging terminal, encodes received information into a radio signal for transmission to a destination communication device, such as a portable transceiver carried by a user. The targeted communication device receives the radio signal and decodes the signal to recover the message information therein. The message information is then stored and displayed to the user. The user can be presented with the message information automatically or in response to user manipulation of controls accessible from the exterior of the communication device.
In one type of prior art communication system, the communication device used by the user for message reception includes a transmitter for transmitting an acknowledge signal back to the message transmission device in response to reception of the message information. In this manner, the message transmission device is notified that the communication device has received the message information. When the acknowledge signal is not received within a predetermined time of message transmission, the message transmission device can retransmit the message to ensure that the communication device receives the message.
In some systems, the communication device can also transmit a "read acknowledge" signal to the message transmission device in response to the presentation of the message by the communication device. Therefore, the message originator can be informed that the user of the communication device has read the message. However, in existing systems that utilize read acknowledge signals, the user of the communication device has no way of determining which messages will result in generation of a read acknowledge signal upon presentation thereof. In such a system, the user of a communication device can be inconvenienced by having to establish communication, such as by telephone or electronic mail, with all message originators of all presented messages if he wants to make sure that all originators know that the messages have been read.
Thus, what is needed is a method and apparatus for informing the user of a communication device of the status of received messages.